puppycrush2 | week three

[That does give him pause. Because that is a number so catastrophically large that it's inconceivable. It's a scale too large to comprehend. Millions and billions which are common numbers that get thrown around in this day and age are still beyond a normal human's comprehension. No one grasps how large a million is. Much less a billion.

Five worlds is... If you assume they're earth sized is... 40 billion.]

Huh. [He's... thinking. The wheels spinning. He won't make a claim that he knows any of these people particularly well. But he and Ritsuka have talked a decent amount. And though it is on a much much much smaller scale he understands the them or me stance very well.

He understands it more in terms of revenge. What wouldn't he do for revenge? The lives of innocents were worth removing. The uproot of families.

Would he have destroyed all of Tokyo to get revenge against his father? Maybe...

The world? It's... hard to know. It's hard to know without that dilemma being right in front of him.

For Ritsuka who is trying to correct history which means, he thinks, bringing back what was lost. If the question became what would he do to get his mother back? Well... The answers might shift slightly, and she is just one person. If there were others? A whole functioning family? Friends?]

You said you stumbled into your job... So if it wasn't you doing this it would be someone else. And it's all for the sake of a world you lost? [He shrugs his shoulders and reaches for their drinks, handing over hers.] Anyone who said they wouldn't do the same is a liar.

It's easy to stand on your high horse when you're not the one holding the gun. Positions reversed there are very few here that wouldn't pull that trigger.

[ She'd somehow had the impression that if anyone was going to avoid pointing a finger at her and calling her some form of genocidal maniac, it was probably going to be him. But then again, what did she know? Everyone's got (mostly) understandable standards and Ritsuka has been pretty horrified by the things she's had to do to give humanity and its history a fighting chance.

She accepts the drink from Akechi know, taking a sip from it in lieu of answering immediately. ]

I don't know if they'd be lying or not. If they haven't had to experience what it's like to have to try to restore their world, then I hope they never have to. And I do think we've got some types who would definitely refuse, but...

... I wanted to live. I wanted my world to live, even if I didn't ask to be caught up in this. Maybe there'll be another answer or something kinder at the end of all of this, or maybe not, but for now, all I can do is keep going.

I'm not going to sugarcoat it. It's horrific.

I think more people would flip the kill switch than you think. We all have the instinct to survive and to protect and covet what little we have. There's few that wouldn't pay the ultimate price to defend one's own existence. And you have to fight all your instincts to just lay down and die...

I've been on both sides so I do understand... I've ruined no few number of lives for my own agenda. But I've also put my throat down on the tracks and gave up so I could live a life to my standards.

I won't pretend I wouldn't do the same thing in your shoes. The instinct to live is rooted so deep and if given the chance to do so... people would take it. How many lives are worth your own? Worth your friends and family? The number should be one to one but cards on the table... it's infinite. Your life is yours and whatever you have to burn and destroy to keep that flame alive is that exact cost.

[He takes a sip of his drink before he continues.]

But those that will never find themselves in that situation or anything close to it... They'll condemn. They'll always condemn and never understand.

If they could understand, then it means they've been in a similar situation. And I don't want that for any of them. [ One of them had approached it on a much smaller scale, but still more than most, and that in itself had been heartbreaking to realize. ]

If it means they condemn me, then they've still got it in them to make their worlds and the lives of the people around them better.

[ It will never get easier. It will never, ever get easier. ]

... What's a life to your standards mean, Akechi-kun?

To my standards? There's a very strict expectation of what life should be and mean and what you do with it back in Japan. But I do think it should be more...

More than a nine to five. More than a wife and kids. And more than being ground under the heel of the machine. That's impossible for most. Society has to continue to chug on. But I want more... I don't want to ever be some cog. Your life feels very... different. Thrilling.

Your atrocities are too great to comprehend. They are on an impossible scale. But there is a freedom to it that most will never have. To go where you have gone and see what you have seen and talk to who you have talked to... A fraction of that would be a life worth living.

[He sips his drink as he continues to ponder just how he wants to phrase what he wants to say.]

Life is a cage and a life to my standards would be to break free of it. [His code name is... was Crow. His motif was a bird. The cunning and crafty bird of many stories and legends.] A life to my standard would be flying free. Leaving everything behind and finding a place that might be worth staying at for a small amount of time. To never be at the risk of being grounded...

[ What a thought, that her atrocities are too great to even fully grasp but that it's still a freedom Akechi desires. Even if it's just a fraction. Which really tells her a lot about how trapped he's felt. It's true that it sounds a little tedious, what society expects.

But when her future goal, or at least a dream she'd had, was to settle down and open up a bakery with someone she loved, she'd never been a wildly adventurous soul. She'd been normal until the situation had stopped being normal and she'll never be the same again. ]

"For a small amount of time," huh.

[ constantly on the move. Flying. No wonder he'd been so enamored with aspects of her life. ]

I think you could probably talk to some of the others here and see what kind of lives you might be able to slip into for a while.

[He stirs his boba with his straw, gaze lowered and thoughtful.]

Kat made in offer.

[Which is a little crazy of her, if you ask him. Insane, even.]

I think... she should stay away from me, to be perfectly honest. But the gesture was one of the kinder things that have happened here.

Really?

[ Surprised, but not necessarily that Kat made an offer. Instead-- ]

I think she's stronger than you're giving her credit for. At the very least, that she can handle things.

Maybe so but still...

[He continues to stir his drink.]

She doesn't seem like the kind of girl that should hang around me. [Neither do most of these kids. Hero oriented personalities that he struggles to get along with. He can't stand it.] There's plenty of places I haven't seen in my own world...

[And the last thing he needs is to risk not belong in a completely different world or state of existence, wherever Kat is from. That won't be good for the psyche.]

Well, it's up to you ultimately. Where you want to go and who you want to go with, if anyone.

But I do think it says a lot that you have options now. [ An exhale, before she sips at her drink. ]

Sappy or not, I'm really glad that you do. It feels like more's opening up to you by the week.

[He chews on his straw as she talks, pondering and considering the options that lay before them and if the road he may walk could even bear any fruit. How wise is it to make lofty plans when the wishes may not come true? When he may not want them to come to pass.]

Do you think so? [It feels like every week he makes to slam more doors closed. Less people like him than the day before which is fine but it narrows the options of this mysterious "perfect" match all the more. Until it clearly is going to boil down to someone who can't stand him.

Perfect is such a joke. There's no one here for him and it's only going to disappoint someone who is here actually looking for something. Sentimental fool they may be.] I find myself disagreeing... But you seem to be a stalwart observer so I won't question what you've seen.

... That is a surprisingly nice way for you to say "bullshit".

[ Like. She's just going to say that. ]

[He rolls his eyes.]

Alright. Then it's bullshit.

Ah. [ Siiiiiip. ]

There he is.

[He continues to chew on his straw, looking down at her with a slightly narrowing gaze.]

Enlighten me as to what you mean by that.

[He knows but it's worth hearing before diving into it.]

I was thinking you were maybe a little too polite with me just now, that's all.

[ This is, in her opinion, a lot better. ]

But I do think you've changed a little, with some of your relationships, from when we first talked on the balcony. Whether you think that's true or not, that's what I did notice.

[Hell. He rolls his eyes.]

Hostile is not my only setting, killer. But it can be if you want. [He tosses his cup into the nearby trash.] Our relationship can change right now if that's what you're aiming for.

I'm not aiming for one thing or another.

[ She doesn't even blink at "killer." She's already been through several attempts of breaking her mind and/or causing her to lose her will to live. This really is nothing. ]

Is it a problem if some people get along with you, even when you're snappy?

I'm not here to play besties. And I'm not here for this unrealistic romantic garbage. I'd be better off if people stopped trying.

And you would be better off if you cared a little less.

Probably. But it's been three years, so I think it's a little too late for me at this point.

[ So she'll just stay as herself, as much as she can. ]

... I don't think anyone's trying to romance you, though?

[ right????? ]

If anyone is trying then they haven't been paying attention to a damn thing in this house.

I don't want anyone's friendship either which people are trying to do. I want to leave this whole garbage experience behind as soon as possible.

That awful, huh?

At least check in with me before you ditch? I did promise you an answer.

[ Well, she's not here to latch onto his legs and drag him kicking and screaming into friendship. It just means she also won't stop what she's been doing. ]

I can do that much, I suppose.

[As one of the people who have pissed him off the least? Sure...]

Good enough for me. Thanks, Akechi-kun.

week three | dates

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